


Wanted Better

by mechanonymouse



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, POV Original Character, Post-Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-02-09
Packaged: 2018-01-11 17:40:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1175969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mechanonymouse/pseuds/mechanonymouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not easy being a single mother, especially not in the Wizarding World, but she managed and Lavender is very proud of her children. </p><p>7 years after the war Molly Weasley goes to visit a woman she's sorely wronged.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wanted Better

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the brilliant [kah-elise-si](http://kah-elise-si.tumblr.com/) without whom this work would be far less readable.

 

Our garret room was small and draughty.  The ceiling uneven and the floor roughly boarded.  Mum had covered most of floor with small irregular rag rugs. When ever she sat down herfingers would be constantly moving, twisting the scraps of fabric and deftly stitching the brightly coloured cords together. She made us thick patchwork quilts filled with soft downy feathers, and all winter bluebell flames burnt in a big glass jar that levitated in the centre of the room.

 

On cold dark winter evenings we would cuddle together under mum's blanket with big mugs of warm milky tea and listen to stories of Hogwarts.  We dreamed of the day we would be old enough to go.

 

She worked as a dressmaker at Madam Malkin's her hands quick and sure with a needle. She made every piece of clothing we owned but wanted better for us. Everyday we walked four streets to the Dame School where ignored by the other children we learnt the basics of schooling.  

 

We were happy, just us and our mum, until a rotund woman with greying red hair knocked on our door one Sunday morning.

 

"Lavender," she choked on a sob. "He wanted you to have this."  She handed mum a lop sided envelope.  "Is that-  Are they..." she trailed off looking behind mum.

 

Mum was very still for a long moment then beckoned us forward, her face pale.  She held us to her.  “This is Ada and Asa.” she said.

 

“They look like Ginny and Ron at their age.”  The woman sobbed, tears and snot running messily down her face.

 

“This is Molly Weasley.  Your father’s mother.”  Mum said.

 

“You haven’t-” Mrs Weasley began.

 

“Go out and play.” Mum pushed us past Mrs Weasley but didn’t wait for us to close the door.  “He didn’t want them,”  She said in the awful shrill staccato tone she used when she was angry.

 

“He wanted you.”  Ginny Weasley said.  The seeker for the Hollyhead Harpies stood on our doorstep with Harry Potter and bushy haired woman we didn’t recognise.

 

The bushy haired woman sighed, “Your dad died during the Battle of Hogwarts.  Marrying your mum and raising a family with her was all he talked about that final year,” she stopped looking down, “but we were on the front lines.” she continued voice cracking.

 

Neither she nor Harry and Ginny said anymore about the war until we were at Hogwarts, but Hermione was the one to tell us then.  Tell us about Horcruxes and three teenagers charged with saving our world.  About our dad who wanted nothing more than to marry a good witch and be a good father.  Tell us about mum mending wounds in the Infirmary two 3 month olds in a transfigured crib next to her. Tell us about Greyback fighting his way to the infirmary and killing dad.  That we were Weasleys, us and mum, and that we were always loved and wanted.

 

They played with us for long hours, those too old ex-soldiers, until our mother came outside with Mrs Weasley.  Mum and Mrs Weasley’s faces were tear streaked and pale.  Mum pulled us tight to her and Mrs Weasley looked like she wanted hold Ginny, Harry and Hermione.

Mum was really quiet for days after Mrs Weasley visited.  She cried late at night.

 

The same time the next week Mrs Weasley arrived bearing hand knitted maroon jumpers and rich cheese pastry.  She sat with us around our rough, rickety table and ate pease pudding with cheese pastry and carrots like it was banquet laid out for the Minister.  She told stories of our father scattering chickens and stealing his brothers’ broomsticks, breaking off midstory to laugh.  When she stood to leave she said, “He was so happy with you, Lavender.  He wanted to win the war and to have a quiet life with a happy family.”

  
After that every week she would come for dinner or Harry, Ginny or Hermione would walk with us and mum along the thickly lined cobbled streets to the Leaky Cauldron.  Where we would throw a handful of bright green floo powder into the fire and say as clearly as we could “The Burrow”.  We would spin furiously round and fall out giggling in the living room of the higgledy-piggledy cottage that only magic could have built, full of the rich smell of Gran’s cooking and the peeling laughter of our cousins Victoire and Teddy.


End file.
